That's up from a mere $2m in 2009, DisplaySearch said. Almost all of those will presumably be Sony's expensive Xel-1.

OLED is seen as the successor to today's LCD and plasma HD TVs, delivering superior colour and much better energy efficiency than current technologies. The snag: for now, at least, making big OLED TVs is colossally expensive.

But surely by 2016 some advances will have been made?

This is unlikely, ccording to DisplaySearch's numbers.

Compare, for example, OLED TV revenues - $2.37bn - with the $37.12bn that LCD TV sales will generate for display makers. That's an order of magnitude more.

Even plasma panels - long held to be on the decline, out-evolved by improved, cheaper LCDs - will, according to DisplaySearch, yielded $3.41bn in 2016 - 32.5 per cent more than OLED.

But OLED will surpass plasma soon after. DisplaySearch has plasma revenues declining by seven per cent year on year, compounded through to 2016, so OLED should push past plasma in 2017 or 2018.

LCD's compound annual growth rate will fall to zero through to 2016, but the sheer scale of sales means t will be a long time before OLED mounts a serious challenge. ®